The mobile shows the way to climate-smart travelling

Published Apr 06, 2010

Mobile applications have considerable potential to make more efficient town traffic and make it more environmentally friendly. The Centre for Sustainable Communications at KTH is about to develop the travel planner of the future thanks to the SEK 9 million which researchers have been awarded through Vinnova’s commitment to environmental innovations.

This is what Trafiken.se now looks like on the Internet.

The idea is to conduct research on the design and introduction of a mobile travel planner which will provide extensive information as to how we can make our way by car, bicycle or public transport in Stockholm and other Swedish regions.

“The objective is to develop a world-leading travel planner as a mobile service which will help people to travel in a climate-smart manner,” says Mattias Höjer, Manager of the Centre for Sustainable Communications at KTH.

A service like this is needed. The climate emissions from traffic amount to approximately 20%. If this could be reduced through a greater use of public transport there would be an environmental gain.

The mobile service will be based on the further development of Trafiken.nu - an advanced website used to plan trips. It will be possible to find the best route which combines different types of traffic in the best possible way. Real-time-based information relating to your vehicle, bus, taxi, transportation services for disabled persons, rented bicycle, common walks and other ways of negotiating the town environment will lead to people choosing climate-smart travel alternatives.

“A good mobile service is required, because you gain the greatest benefit from a travel planner when you’re travelling on foot and when you have to make a decision as to which route to take, or adjust your route along the way,” says Anna Kramers, KTH researcher and assisting project leader.

Ultimately it is envisaged that the mobile travel planner will be able to help the user to look up various alternatives including how long it will take and environmental impact in a simple and useful way.

“The mobile service will also be to learn from the user’s behaviour and travel patterns and produce the best travel route based on this. It is all about making Trafiken.nu even better, more accessible, with more functions. Which in the long run also includes the possibility of paying for trips on public transport directly in your mobile telephone,” says Anna Kramers.

She adds that the objective of the mobile travel planner is to get as many people as possible to travel on public transport instead of using their own car.

The project has been awarded SEK 9 million via the Vinnova call for Environmental innovations and is a joint effort between CESC, Stockholms stad, Trafiken.nu, Regionplanekontoret (the Regional Planning Office), Trafikverket (the National Road Administration), Institutet för Framtidsstudier (The Institute for Future Studies) and Ericsson.